Happy Leap Day! I, for one, am happy that February is over. It really is the longest month. Anyway, I tried on my skinny jeans tonight and they are too big. When I say too big, I mean like three inches too big on the waist. I am not sure what I did wrong. I followed Nancy's alteration directions, but to no avail. I would have to rip apart the seams and re-cut the pieces. I don't think I am going to do that. I may though. I really want skinny jeans! I tried on my store-bought skinny jeans and I am not quite able to wear them yet. I think another 5 pound loss should do it. I really want to perfect a pants pattern, so I am not going to stop trying. I may just buy more dark denim material and try again. It would be so great to be able to just make pants whenever I want. Really, any piece of clothing, because that is the reason I started to sew. I wanted to be able to reproduce the styles I saw on the runways because I can't afford to actually buy anything. I will get there. Hopefully before I am too old to see to thread the needle!

I finished my jacket and as promised, here is a photo. It was pretty easy, although I did have to re-do one of the sleeves. I used a hook and eye for a closure. Tomorrow I will start on the oft-mentioned skinny jeans!

Hey! I have been working diligently on my short-sleeved jacket. Everything is finished, except for the sleeves. There is a band that is attached to the bottom of the sleeve that has to be slip-stitched to the rest of the sleeve and I am doing that by hand. I am not the fastest hand sewer. I should have it finished within the next day or so. I will post a picture when it is finished.

My next project will be the skinny jeans from Burdastyle (see my previous post). I was watching TV last Sunday afternoon and I stumbled upon Sewing With Nancy with Nancy Zieman and she was demonstrating an alteration technique called pivot and slide. I feel like such an idiot. I have been doing alterations all wrong! I really like her. She can explain something so quickly that I have spent hours reading in a book and still don't know. Anyway, my point is that the skinny jeans pattern needs to be altered to fit me and I will be using this method. I may take photos and post them as I alter, but I don't know. I like to multi-task when I sew: sew a little, watch some TV, surf the Web. It suits my short attention span. I am pretty excited about trying something new. Even if I don't post photos of the work in progress, I will post photos of the finished project.

Well! It's been a long time since I have posted. I really didn't think it was almost two months! That is too long! I ended up not making any Christmas gifts. I wanted to, but didn't have the time. I had to go to New York for work last month and I wanted to sew some clothes for my trip. Alas, I didn't do that either. I ended up buying pants at Old Navy and hemming them. So, so much for that! I work from home and don't go a lot of places. That doesn't stop me from making things for the life I wish I had. To that end, I finished the jacket made out of purple velvet. Here is a photo:



And here is a photo of the cool buttons I used. They are Route 66 buttons:


I was shopping at my mom's house last weekend and she let me snag all of her military-type buttons, which was incredibly cool. I have two more jackets to make. One is a short-sleeve number in light blue velvet which I am sure I mentioned, and the other is an off-the-shoulder style, McCall's #5478. The buttons will definitely come in handy.

I also downloaded a skinny jeans pattern from Burdastyle.com. It is an open-source sewing website with free patterns. You download all of the pieces, tape them together, and then cut out the pattern. I am using clearanced stretch denim I found at JoAnn's when I was looking for the buttons. I do have a place to where these along with that off-the-shoulder jacket. It is good to have a deadline. Now if I can get the cat to stop laying on my material!

The Toledo Lucas County Public library had one of their really great book sales last weekend and of course I went. I snagged a bunch of really great sewing books, such as Fine Machine Sewing by Carol Ahles. I was actually going to buy this book on Amazon. Other titles include Fashion Sewing By The Bishop Method, Making Patterns From Finished Clothes, Vogue Fitting, Vogue Sewing For The Home, Good Housekeeping's Home Dressmaking, and Sew Much Better from the Editors of Sew News. Good stuff! There are several more book sales scheduled for this year and I will definitely attend. It seems every time I go, they have different books. If you recall, the last time I went I purchased the entire Time-Life set of The Art of Sewing for a song.

One more thing and I will call it a night. My mom and husband both volunteered at Fort Meigs, which is a local War of 1812-era fort. They have re-enactments in period costume. I am going to volunteer to and sew some costumes! It will be fun and I may even get to wear it around. I have attended Halloween events at the Fort at night and it is a pretty cool place. It was the site of a battle and it is on a bluff overlooking the Maumee River. It is a pretty spooky place and very cool. Google it and check it out.

P.S. I added a link to BurdaStyle to the right so you can go directly to the site. Happy downloading!